Lithuania is full of beautifully painted wooden houses. The blue, green, red and orange houses manage to add color even to the longest and coldest of winters.
On a visit to Druskininkai I saw that this is not limited to human dwellings:
Maybe a book that promises “a general’s inside account of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and how it all went wrong” had to disappoint, but I didn’t expect it to disappoint so much.
Lieutenant General Bolger sounds contrite in the introduction: “Our primary failing in the war involved generalship”, “we demonstrated poor strategic and operational leadership”, “This was our war to lose, and we did.” So I expected some sharp analysis with clear lessons and recommendations. Instead, I got plenty of detailed accounts of specific engagements with the enemy, a firefight here, a raid there, an ambush over there. Maybe there is something to be learnt from these action-novel type stories, but Bolger doesn’t draw any conclusions. He doesn’t connect them, there is no big-picture analysis.
Whenever Bolger writes about the political, cultural and religious situation in the Middle East, you can sense his uncertainty about the situation by his referrals to “they”, “them”, “these people” as if everyone living in Iraq or Afghanistan are part of one monolithic group, or to Shia and Sunni as if this is the only important characteristic shaping someone’s views towards a foreign power or international forces. His understanding of the Middle East is very simplistic, and maybe this in a way does explain “why we lost,” although probably not the way the author had intended.
I already wanted to quit the book when I came across the term “fire-worshipping Zoroastrian Yezidi” (p. 158). Yezidi are distinct from Zoroastrians and neither of them are “fire-worshipping,” which if used without any explanation makes them appear like cavemen. It’s like calling Catholics a “candle-worshipping religion”.
I continued, hoping for the book to improve. But then it got to Abu Ghraib and the mistreatment of prisoners (p. 168-170). Bolger expresses understanding for the US soldiers who humiliated and abused Iraqi prisoners and attributes part of the blame to “captive Iraqis [who] proved anything but docile”. Granted, they probably weren’t, but I don’t see how this could justify mistreatment. Bolger realizes the negative effect of Abu Ghraib, but tries to pin it on a “a few dumb young MPs [who] inflicted a lot of damage to the U.S.”
I fired the book into a corner when I read “To counter all the hyperventilation about torture, some perspective is in order. The U.S. military did not torture anyone. None of the subjects of the Abu Ghraib photos were killed or injured,” and so on, apologetically and, particularly with hindsight, strangely out of touch with evidence.
General Bolger still displays the reflexes of protecting the people serving under him (maybe honorable while in service, although even this is doubtful in cases like Abu Ghraib, but definitely not helpful for an honest analysis) and of an Army guy who puts all blame for torture on the CIA. But if someone writes in 2014 that “the CIA apparently had some different rules, but even they very rarely apply any enhanced interrogation techniques, none that are life-threatening,” I must assume that the author didn’t follow the news very closely. Even before the release of the report on CIA torture by the Senate Intelligence Committee, many cases of torture, and yes, death and other long-lasting adverse physical effects, were reported.
So I stopped reading on page 169 of 436 pages, because what could you possibly learn from such an author? Not only a superfluous, but indeed a terrible book. Older, but much better: Imperial Life in the Emerald City by Rajiv Chandrasekaran.
Visitors who come to Berlin often wonder: “What happened to the Berlin Wall?”
I found a chunk of it in Lithuania, at Europos Parkas, an outdoor art museum.
To address any suspicions about larceny: it was a gift by the Federal Republic of Germany.
No wonder there isn’t much left of the Berlin Wall to see in Berlin if most of it was given away, because Germany didn’t want to afford a proper present.
Compared with the people living in these houses which I photographed from the train to the Montenegrin mountains, Henry David Thoreau lived in the center of civilization.
You may need to click on the photos in order to enlarge them to even see the houses.
I could somehow reconstruct the names and purposes of all these buildings with a map, but I hope that some of my readers from Belgrade will do this much more easily. :-)
Deep in Venice, between all the ostentatious palaces, the churches, cathedrals and museums, there are a few wooden sheds, so out of place as if they had just arrived this morning with the train from South Tyrol.
This is where carpenters make the gondolas.
And these are the finished products:
When you watch the trailer for Everest,
you may well get the feeling that you have seen it all before: the mountains, the snow, the storm, the helicopter, the drama, the danger, the good-looking tough guy risking his life for an adventure.
And if you are a devoted reader of my blog, you remember correctly:
So, this is what they mean with “based on a true story”.
Where we find water: on Mars, between 34 and 250 million miles away
Where we can’t provide safe drinking water to around 750 million people: our own planet
Sorry, poor people, but this whole space thing is much more exciting.
Researching for my trip to South America, I came across this little country that I knew nothing about – Suriname – and its capital city – Paramaribo – which I couldn’t have named before. And then I saw this photo of a synagogue next to a mosque (there are also Christian churches and Hindu temples in town) and I got a feeling that Suriname might become one of the most interesting countries on my tour.
Might this country in the South American jungle with its Indian, Creole, Indonesian, Maroon, Amerindian, Chinese and Dutch population who are Christian, Hindu, Muslims, Buddhists, Jews, traditional African believers and hopefully also a few Atheists provide some lessons for Europe at a time of increased immigration and diversity? It sounds like multiculturalism is nothing new and the “waves” of immigrants coming to Europe are tiny compared with those absorbed by other continents at other times, including immigrants from Europe. If small South American countries can do it, why shouldn’t Europe be able to benefit from this mix of cultures, languages and religions?
I will hopefully find out in 2016!
The airport (“aerodrom”) in Podgorica, Montenegro:
Ok, this is not the airport, but it is the train station for the airport. Unfortunately, I only found out about it later. When I arrived, I asked the lady at the airport information desk if there are any buses or trains into town. She said – incorrectly – that there are none. The taxi cost 15 € (Montenegro doesn’t have its own currency), for which I could have taken the train through the whole country several times.
Yes, you need to get off here for the airport.
On the website of the Montenegrin Railway (English version available), you can find the schedule. The stop is about 1 km west of the airport exit, on the other side of the highway. The train to Podgorica costs 1.20 €.
